THOUSANDS of squatters who overran white-owned farms in Zimbabwe in the biggest mass occupation of recent times are leaving their promised land and walking home.
They feel betrayed by Robert Mugabe, the faltering, 76-year-old president whose government lured the urban poor into the countryside with pledges that they would share not only lands once known as the breadbasket of Africa, but also food and petrol that would be essential to survive while they awaited their first harvest. The supplies have not arrived amid a fuel crisis so severe that commuters have been involved in shoot-outs at petrol stations.
When the land rush began last month, prompted by Mugabe's cynical attempt to distract attention from the country's economic woes and from his own failure to win a constitutional referendum that would have extended his rule by a decade, up to 70,000 people stepped onto state-sponsored buses that ferried them to the farm gates. That was the last state aid many hapless squatters saw. Two weeks ago, as many as 700 of the 3,500 white-owned farms were under occupation, but last week, according to confidential official estimates, the number of squatters was down to 58,000 on 400 farms. There is a pattern here that is unnerving Mugabe's kitchen cabinet, if not the increasingly detached president himself. Most of the farms still occupied are in Mashonaland, his tribal stronghold between Harare, the capital, and the northern borders towards Zambia. There, leaders such as Comrade Jesus, a former guerrilla commander, are easily recognised by their trademark rifles in one hand and their mobile phones, constantly dialling Harare, in the other. But towards the borders with Botswana, South Africa and Mozambique, local people are voting with their feet. At least, say critics, the mass occupation has taken place openly. Last week Margaret Dongo, one of three opposition MPs, published a list of 424 previously white-owned farms that had been bought on the open market and given on rent-free, 98-year leases to leading government members and cronies. Among the beneficiaries have been Perence Shiri, who led the infamous North Korea-trained Fifth Brigade when it butchered 5,000 Matabeles in an undeclared civil war in the 1980s. He now owns a substantial farm in Matabeleland. Another rent-free arrival is Rex Nhongo, who led Mugabe's guerrilla army in exile in the 1970s. He has changed his name - to Solomon Majuru - and his politics, and is now one of the country's most tough-minded landlords. Most white farmers have coped well with the influx of barefooted would-be masters. The Sinclair family, who have farmed the same fields 40 miles west of Harare since the 1930s, and export flowers to Europe, were nonplussed but not surprised when they were declared "foreigners" on their own land. But the invaders were surprised by the attitude of the Sinclairs' black farm hands, who refused to speak to them. A few days later, weary of the rain, unsure what to do with the mechanised farm equipment and upset at the failure of aid to materialise, they drifted away. Mugabe's reaction to the setbacks has been twofold: he has purged his cabinet of old comrades such as Kumbirai Kangai, the agriculture minister, who was arrested on Ł2.7m theft charges last week; and has started rumours that the mood of unrest is so great that he might have to postpone forthcoming elections from late next month until the summer. The final throw of the dice, which might be prompted by the continued refusal of Kuwait to sell Zimbabwe any more oil, would be to declare a state of emergency. But there is still one force to be reckoned with. One Zimbabwean commentator said: "He played the race card, but the failure of the farm invasion has only revealed a busted flush. Now everyone will wait to see what is in the army's hand."